Alamo at Hive Doltous
by Kufspawn
Summary: After days of bombardment and siege, the defenders of Hive Doltous are now anticipating the arrival an Archenemy's final push to break through the Hive's walls. Emperor's grace be upon those brave few that stand in front of this tide of heretics.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer and Author's Comments:

Hey first story's finally up, read, review and enjoy. If you find anything wrong and anything please tell me about it so I can improve on it next time. And also I d like to thank ArashiSeisai and her mom for proof reading and helping me edit this.

I don't own anything from Games Workshop, races weapons and other items in here are all theirs and I own only the characters and the events that reside in it.

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**CHAPTER ONE **

FIRES ILLUMINATED THE night sky as rows and rows of the outer hab blocks glow with orange and yellow fires that lick at the cores outside the walls of Hive Doltous. The spire, extending beyond the over cast clouds spews smoke and flames after nearly a week of constant bombardment from the Archenemy forces just gathering beyond the Hive's artillery range. Flashes of the sides' batteries, Earthshaker cannons, and all sorts of other heavy and light artillery pieces boom through the night, their muzzle flashes spewing smoke and flames.

The whistling of the ordinance echo back and forth as the each side volleys their cannons. Geysers of mud, smoke, plastcrete, and bodies shoot meters into the night sky as great as the pillars that flank the battered and blasted Northern Gate of the Hive. Huddling in their fire pits, their trenches, their bunkers, and lining the final stretch of the walls just two kilometer from the Hive's spire, men and women of both the Nordian 71st Planetary Defense Force, and the Cadian 427th gather and wait for the final and ever coming final push that is awaiting after this torrent of falling steel and fire.

HOLDING ON TO his las rifle with a grip that can only be compared to a tech priest's servo arm pinching a pipe shut, Trooper Haldwan rummages through his pack for any remaining las batteries that he hadn't thrown away from the Archenemy's last push. The bombardment just a common and unimportant event that he and many others have grown accustom too over the past few days, didn't bother him as he managed at least two more battery packs out from his tattered rucksack and thigh pocket. Six spent packs.

Sighing to himself, Haldwan glances to his small contingent of random mixes of dark blue trench coats with a off white steel pot shaped helmets of the Nordian natives with their auto rifles beside them, and the chipped green carapace armor and tattered grey clothing with las rifle weapons of the Cadian troopers. The supposed 'relief force' so proclaimed by many of the civvi's of this Spire.

Grabbing a few of the last packs Haldwan threw them into the fire that was burning at the mid of this small gathering of soldiers. The metal packs clattering noisily, though not enough to drown the whistles and thudding explosions going on just a few decameters around them, against the several others that were thrown in there to give them a few more shots that were desperately needed to last another day or week longer.

Leaning back, against the shot up wall of a destroyed hab just by the 'Alamo's walls,' the name of this infamous battle so many millennium ago; Haldwan pulls out a beaten ration kit from his rucksack. Cursing to himself seeing it was shot through with a las bolt from the last fight. Pulling back the broken foil cover, he began to spoon the mashed and mixed pile of scrap that was called food; nearly spitting it back up feeling that the cold gruel was worse because of the ozone and burnt air that came from the las bolt.

"Trooper!" a voice boomed loudly making Haldwan jump, nearly dropping his poor excuse for food. He looked out of the corner of his eye and automatically knew who it was by the voice.

"Oh Throne…. Frack me." He groans looking up to the Cadian sergeant that was tapping her boot impatient, the bottom of a knife sheath tapping on the dusty ground as well. "What is it Tonia?" He says slightly annoyed putting the ration case on the floor beside him as well as bringing his las rifle back into his hold.

"Why aren't you watching the line?" She snapped venomously to him. The other Cadians and Nordian troopers slinked back to where they were, keeping out of this verbal fight. Tonia, a slender Cadian, she fought long and hard to stand against the opinions of others and prove her worth to the 427th, by personally killing a dozen Archenemy soldiers in hand to hand with her knife. The scar over her right cheek and a over her eye was testament enough to that.

"Because knowing what kind of shit hole this place will become, chances are that I will be in wooden box by tomorrow night." Haldwan shrugged. A little laughter sounded from one of Nordian soldiers in the back. "Plus, I'd love to have a last meal before I take one for the God Emperor." He says sarcastically, bringing in more laughter from the rest of the other soldiers watching down their lines.

"That ego of yours will bloat your head, trooper, might want to let it down because your head will be the size of a bane blade if you keep shooting your mouth off like that." She smirked and tapped her las pistol at her hip. "Or would you like me to do them the honors?"

The laughter was becoming contagious, even Haldwan could not hide it. Laughing loudly over the booms and falling plastcrete he shrugged. "Depends if you want to have them waste their shots on my head or waste yours on blasting my big ol' bloated ego, as you just mentioned." He laughed again. Tonia's smirk grew and she turned on her heels and walked back to her position a few meters down the line. The laughing was loud as it faded away to the droning, rolling thunder.

Leaning back against the wall, Haldwan unhooked the flask from his side and opened the top, taking a swig of water from it before putting it back on, and hooking back on to his belt. Watching the flames that were holding his batteries as the charged weakly in it, he hummed a hymn to himself to pass the time as well as to drown the noise of the shell fire.

He looked out to the wall, and set down his las rifle, propping it against the wall. Bringing his 'holy' pile of gruel to his lap and finishes eating the grey and brown substance that was to be the supposed last meal, or so he told Tonia. Sighing again, Haldwan looked to rows of muzzle flashes several kilometers down and over the hills, hearing the screeching shells soar over head and smash into the Spire. Flinching at the sight of the tower of metal and steel rupture internally from another fusillade of artillery, the sounds of twisting metal and blasting air was enough to bring everyone out of their brief laughter to realize what tomorrow will bring.

Looking away from the struggling Hive, another explosion rips across the spire. The powder holds or another magazine, maybe, detonated. What ever it was, it washed the area of possibly half a kilometer wide with an orange wash of flame. The thunderous boom echoed loudly through the emplacements and rattled the defenders. "Tomorrow's going to be hell…. "A Nordian private says near by looking up to the raising smoke and flames of the explosion.

"No kidding." Haldwan replies spooning the last of his gruel into his gullet and tossing the tin aside. "It's going to be the best fracking day of my whole fracking life." He laughed darkly. Laying his las rifle across his lap, pulling off his tri dome helmet; looking inside the lining, was an old pict of his wife and daughter back on Cadia. Smiling slightly, Haldwan put the helmet back on and looked to the orange and black sky.

THE FLOOR TILES rattled loudly over the apparently ceaseless bombardment. General Leair looked out to the smoke choked sky and equally shrouded land of hills and plains before him. He held a small glass of some Nordian liquor loosely in his hand with the other placed behind him, tapping the bottom of his ceremonial power saber. With white carapace armor and a dark blue long coat, Leair gazed on to the rows of gathering Archenemy soldiers; seeing each cannon and artillery flash down the lines.

"Leair?" A voice called from behind him. To which Leair turned and clicked his heels to face the table of remaining few officers from the line. Down the left side was Captain Obel of the 6th Nordian Mobile Artillery that had stationed a dozen Basilisks tanks on the inside of the Northern and western walls. Colonel Lautz of the Nordian 18th Defense Infantry, his soldiers with the combined number of Colonel Flaucks 20th Infantry number at least eight thousand with Doltous replacements. On the right side of the table, Captain Feygorn, Captain Elim and Major Dotson are the commanders of the remaining three thousand Cadian 427th guardsmen that were sent to be the relief force, or in this case, long term reinforcement.

"Leair? Shall we continue this discussion?" Dotson asks taking his beret off and placing it on the table on the corner of a data slate that was on top of large half meter by meter over lay of the Spire and the surrounding area. "General, sir?" He pressed on.

"Yeah, lets." Leair says calmly walking over to the table standing with his back to the cracked and chipped observation window. "So what is the up-. " The floor rattled and shook once again as a chain of explosions rippled a dozen meters below them. Light from the billowing flames glow against the glass as they ascend to the sky. Glancing over his shoulder for a second, Leair faces the gathering of commanders. "So…what is the update from Air Recon?" He asks to them.

Elim and Feygorn scattered a short stack of data slates and handed a three of them to Leair. He pulled out the stylus and tapped the edge of the slate. Scrolling and scanning through the picts and information that was recorded from gun cameras and high speed passes of low flying Lightings, the final and total out come was to be about fifty thousand Archenemy forces, backed with at least one to one hundred and fifty thousand artillery pieces and over two thousand armored typed units.

"Sir…it looks grim… we're out numbered greatly." Obel says looking through the copies of extra data slates. "If we lose hold now, nothing can stop them from breaking through the Hive."

"We're not pulling back." Leair replies coldly. "We have no where else too go but to either fight it here, or die."

"But you can't seriously mean-!" Obel's interjection was cut off by the floor bucking heavily from another close strike to their position. "You can't seriously mean to stand up to them!?" He spat, jabbing an open palm to the flashes of the artillery pieces that were out there as well as the sea of moving bodies just in front of the artillery line.

"I am and we are holding here!" Leair shouts to them, a sudden chill surged through Oble's spine and stood upright. "I need your artillery to move further back to the Main Spire. It will be best for a counter infantry shelling before they reach and if they ever break through the walls." He says to him pointing to a sloping hill just a quarter kilometer in front of the Spire. Oble saluted and nodded.

"Lautz, your men, move them back with the artillery as well as Flaucks. A reserve line is needed at the least the Cadian's request either assistance to hold or cover when they pull back." The two Nordian officers and the three Cadian soldiers saluted. "Here's to victory, or a heroic demise." He chuckled raising his glass. "Emperor protects." The glasses cling and all six men down the last of their drinks before departing.

Dust trails fall to the floor as more explosions rock the floor. Leair turned to face the window once more, stepping closer and over watching the bombardment continue. He lowers his head and takes off his peaked cap, placing it on the pile of data slates. "Orderly." He calls out in to the semi empty room. A Nordian guardsman, clad in the same uniform as Leair steps up behind him, snapping a salute.

"Yes General?" He asks, his voice quivering a bit.

"Gather my old company, tell any trained driver, gunner, engineer, and mechanic that are either dismounted or has no vehicle to assemble at ground level, hold seven by tomorrow morning." He says with a small grin on his face.

The orderly snapped a final salute before disappearing behind the curtains to the comms room. "If this is to be my last day to fight for the Emperor, I might as well help where it is needed most." He sighs and walks down to the lift just outside in the halls. "Down on the fields." The doors slam shut as the gears wined and groan. Slowly the lift descends down the shaft, clattering over the noise of the bombardment outside.

ALL THROUGH THE night the Archenemy artillery slugged it out with the Doltous batteries. The explosions of magazines and powder holders spat fire and debris from the already pyre of what the Hive was. The outer habs just several meters from the wall face was now a crater riddle, moon like surface. The once lavish and extensive mix of dark green grassland and agri-domes was now a smoking, pitted landscape, burnt out and lit with several fires of both buildings and grass land alike.

The concentrated bombardment of the several hundreds of heavy artillery of the Archenemy's large caliber guns nearly decimated most of the Hive's and Imperial artillery placements inside the spires holding and weaponry's platforms. Fire and smoke billowed high into the cloudy grey sky of the morning as a light rain began to patter down from over head, another rain of sorts, to what many have just experienced; a rain of metal and a rain of water.

Hours past the sun rise, the beams of what ever solar light that filtered through the cloud cover made everything clear. It showed how battered both the Hive's spire and the land before them was blasted. The out come looked grim for the defenders of Doltous. The remaining eleven thousand Cadian soldiers, Nordian PDF's , and Doltous security and militia waited for the final push to arrive, for their lasting moments to hold off what they defended against for nearly a month. The Archenemy's great push, the attack that will wipe this Hive off the planet.

With in minutes, the flag was raised. The Archenemy's cannons ceased at exactly 0010 hours. The Imperial defenders craned their heads to the sudden cease of return cannonade fire. It has arrived…

THE KLAXONS SOUNDED a loud blaring of alarms echoed through the still moonscape of the land. The sound reached for kilometers around the area. Alerts and shouts called from all over. Men and women, dressed in blue and white, and green and grey, scurried, sprinted, ran, dashed, and bolted to their positions through the muddied and wet streets and causeways of their defenses. Fires were doused from the night before as troopers grabbed their batteries packs that they let charge over night in the flames of their fire pits and bond fires.

Haldwan kicked dirt and poured the last of his second flask of water over the weakened fire. Klaxons blaring nearby from a lamp sound system. He glared at the device pulling out as many battery packs as he could, stuffing them into his thigh pockets. "Somebody turn those fracking things off!" Tonia shouted grabbing her own set packs.

She looked up to Haldwan and smirked. "Well here's your chance to put your words from last night to the test. How was your last meal?" She asked him a slight laugh leaving her lips still slipping a few battery packs into her pockets.

"Well like most meals – like shit. Have yours?" he said coolly.

" Nope, love to give myself some thing to fight for."

"Oh really? What will that be?"

"I fight, and get my next meal from the bets of others here. I got a reputation to uphold remember?" she laughed walking away from the fire pit, her pockets stuffed with las batteries.

"Ah of course, our little fighter here." He laughed and walked to take up positions beside her on the wall's defense line up top taking a ladder inside the wall up to fire steps ten meters above. Haldwan glanced to his left; Tonia was checking the power of her las rifle, after slamming a battery pack into the hold in front of the hand grip. To his right, were Trooper Dremnond, his squad's stubber, and his assistant, Trooper Jaxson. These two heavy weapon's specialists were about average height, Dremnond was a thin and tanned fellow from the northern part of Cadia. Jaxson, on the other hand, is actually not part from Cadia or any other planet from that system, he was a replacement for Dremnond's last assistant that took a las bolt to the face a few weeks back here on Nordia.

Wiping off the streaks of rain water that were trailing down his face, Haldwan leveled his las rifle, sighting it and clearing the single lens sight. Opening the flap to his thigh pocket he pulled out one las batter and slammed it in to the housing of the his weapon and heard the sweet sound of the rifle charging up and whine down as it charged. Looking to the shot counter at the base of the stock, he groaned a little. "Frack me… ten shots… not good, that means we're going to be spent by the end of this afternoon."

"Well all the more reason to pick your damn shots!" Hissed Tonia kneeling right beside him, setting up her las rifle to do the same "Plus I got a clip of seven, you shouldn't be complaining." She sighed. "Dremnond, how's your 50?" Tonia asks leaning back to see the two heavy weapon specialists setting up the tripod of their heavy stubber.

Jaxson raised a thumb and called over the patter of rain. "All swell sarg!" He chuckled, helping Dremnond slip a belt of 50 caliber slugs into the feed. He closed the top and pulled the hammer back twice. The click of the mechanism chambering a shot was like music as several other auto and stubber weapons clicked off their safeties and began chambering rounds.

A LINE OF twelve Basilisk earth shaker tanks lined a sloping crest just three quarters of a kilometer behind the forward wall. Their 120 millimeter cannons craned sky wards, as their crews winched and swiveled the long barrels to the set bearings. "Elevation?" Calls Gunnery Officer Ulrich over the sound of rain pattering on their helmets and their armored cannon.

Spotter Uriz looked down his mono sight, looking at the calculated measurements on the side of sight. "Elevation – 34 degrees."

"Distance?"

"Distance - Fifteen hundred meters."

"Load 120 millimeter H.E round!" Ulrich calls to Loader Yorke, standing beside him.

Yorke nodded and picked up a shell from the crate on the rear platform. Holding it with both hands to his chest he placed the cannon on the slide. Ulrich carried one pack of powder and rested behind the copper shell, and was followed through with him and Yorke lifting the slide and getting pushed up the rear portion of the Earthshaker cannon by the two of them.

Uriz turned and closed the hatch, once Yorke and Ulrich called 'loaded.' All three stepped back, the Gunnery Officer held the lanyard. Awaiting the order to commence and they waited their officer's call over the vox horn hanging beside them on the railing.

GROANING TREADS OF tanks and the sound of thumping boots reverberated through the defenses. The alarms had ceased and given way to silence. They were coming. A massive roar, a disjointed war cry or chant not meant to be heard by the ears of man filled the unbearable stillness. As if it was a cue, the ground began to tremble. Thousands upon thousands of armored vehicles, all comprised of some sort of variant of all types tanks or wheeled transport. With the sizes of the massive armored spear head, a sea of bodies began their surge forwards.

Their dark red long coats, matte black domed helmets, and discharging auto and las rifles trampled behind the rolling line of armor, this was to be it.

The Archenemy had amassed a large force of a still uncertain size. But this was the thing, the Imperial defenders of Doltous were ready for them, the remaining Nordian and Cadian guardsmen and women that held to their faith this long were not ready to have it falter yet.

"In the name of Emperor, you will hold the line! In the name of the Emperor you will not fail him now!" Was the order being bellowed through the vox channels, and shouted by both the officers and the rarely seen Commissars that wandered and probed the lines. "In the name of the Emperor, hold the line...!"

"YOU WILL FRACKING hold the damn line!" Tonia screamed over her vox bead, raising the las rifle to her shoulder, pressing her scared cheek to the stock. Taking aim over the lip of the wall, she looked down the sight of the rifle. Haldwan followed, his muscles trained to the repetitive sequencing of aiming, sighting, and firing of his own personal las weapon. The defenders held their fire, waiting for the call to open up. The Archenemy was still too far for las fire, but their heavy weapons were not. A grin crossed Tonia's mouth as she pressed bead into her ear. "Let the 50's rattle!" She shouted to Jaxson and Dremnond .

"Aye aye!" They spouted back. Dremnond tilted the stubber down to the surging bodies and thumbed the triggers. The frame of the heavy machine gun rattled, spitting 50 caliber shells into the charging Chaos forces. Over the sound of the heavy stubber, the deeper rattling and thumps of heavy bolters and missile tubes mixed in with the chorus of heavy weapons fire.

Archenemy troopers crumpled and fell where they were hit; the first line of rushing chaos soldiers was utterly eviscerated by the raking fire of stubber slugs and the detonating bolter shots that whittled away at them. Explosions rippled down the armored spear head, the blood crimson painted hulls ruptured with missile strikes. One leman russ, pattern unknown, imploded from a lucky streak, sending its hull blowing backwards and over into a shell hole. A secondary explosion from the fuel and tank rounds vaporized the hull and sent several Archenemy foot soldiers scattering.

Cheers and wallops of joy echoed through the defenses as the Chaos forces began to run and scatter faltering under the fire. But that did not deter the Archenemy for long. Dark calls rang over the chaos channels, forcing them to regroup, to rally under the banners of Khorne. As the first wave of tanks and soldiers broke and routed back to the hills, a second line surged forwards merging with the first and pressing the attack onwards again. The scattered lines clump and gather striding back onwards over the bodies of their fallen towards the Imperials.

Trampling over the dead and wounded of the first charge the second and remnants of the first rushed head long into the fire that ceased their first efforts. Dark litanies sound and catch the ears of the besieged troops in the walls, the sight of the dark and heretical symbols make many look on with disgust as they marched in to the face of bolter, slug and rocket fire.

JUST IN FRONT of Haldwan and Tonia's positions on the walls. Captain Elim looked one with his mono sight, held firmly in his left hand and his bolt pistol readied in his right. Lowering the sight, he turned to his vox officer, Communications Trooper Bently, who stood up seeing Elim turn to him. "Yes sir?" He says quickly resting a hand on the top of his vox caster that was leaning against the sand bag wall of the dug out.

"Hand me the horn." Elim replied setting the sight down on the rim of the sand bags, holding his now empty hand to Bently.

"Aye sir." The comms trooper acknowledged and pulled a small ear and head set piece from the back end of the bulky vox set and placed it in his CO's hand.

Bringing the piece to his ear and pressing the bead to the side of his mouth Elim scanned the moving line of Archenemy soldiers before him. A small grin cracked across his lips, accenting the shallow scar that crescent his left cheek. "Attention all Imperial forces, it seems our scum has made it past the line. On my mark, single shot las fire on any and all targets of opportunity. The highest score will get drinks on me." He laughed.

Handing the head set back to Bently, and brought up his pistol. His vox officer nodded and put his arms through the shoulder straps and checked the system again. Swinging his las rifle off his shoulder and holding it firmly in his hands Bently smirked and brought up his las rifle. "On your mark sir."

Elim grinned and leveled his bolt pistol ahead out of the dug out. "Of course." He said and depressed the trigger, the pistol bucked back as the explosive round shot out of the barrel and spun tip first into a Chaos soldier's skull. The round detonated, leaving the upper chest, shoulders, and head just a mist of dark crimson.

"FIRE!" THE VOX channels blared with Obel's voice from the speakers on the side of railing. He raised his field goggles as the twelve heavy cannons thundered off in unison. The barrels kicked back as the lanyards were pulled, the blasted air launched stones and dirt southwards as the 120 millimeter shells rocketed into the air. Whistles of the falling rounds just three seconds later just reached Obel's ears as he looked through the field goggles to see the damage

"Load up second volley!" Was the command that followed as the shells landed home in the midst of the packed bodies of the Archenemy foot soldiers and tanks. Obel grinned seeing three vehicles vanish in an intense ball of white and orange fire from direct hits and other topple over into craters that pock marked the remaining land. He couldn't count the numbers of chaos soldiers that were slaughtered by the effect High Explosive rounds but he knew that there were going to a lot of them not standing back up.

"Readjust aim."

"New target – distance 450 meters, elevation 56 degrees."

A new shell was slammed into the housing and the hatch was shut.

"Fire!" Obel's voice crackled through the voxes, the guns thundered for a second volley.

SNAPPING LAS FIRE from the wall defenses opened up with the first volley of the Basilisks. Their weapons sending wave after wave of bright red streaks of compressed energy and light mix with the torrent of fire from the ground level defenders. Their shots vaporizing hundreds in the massing wave of cultists. But there seemed to be no end or falter in the tide. The Archenemy pressed on facing the onslaught of fire that cut many down in its massed volley of fire.

"They're getting too close!" Haldwan cried, slamming another battery pack into his las rifle, leaning against the wall propping his weapon on the plastcrete top, sighting down the low power scope on it. _Snap! Snap! Snap!_ Another cultist dropped tri shots from his weapon to the chest.

"Just keep shooting! Shooting them is better than shooting your mouth off to me." Tonia called back picking off another Archenemy soldier with a clean head shot from her weapon. "Twenty –four."

"Really? That's how many you got?" He laughed, his las rifle snapped again, forcing

another soldier to crumple into the pitted earth. "That one makes twenty-seven." He grinned.

"No way are you going to out score me!" Tonia smirked, looking for a good target; her smirk widened seeing a staggering flame trooper crawl out from the edge of a crater. "Now watch this." She called to Haldwan. He glanced to over to her when the las rifle kicked back.

The shot struck the top of the chemical tank that held the flammable fuels for the flamer, and sparked. Fire ruptured out wards in a massive spray that engulfed four Chaos troopers behind him. Covered in promethium and fire, they spun and tried to pat out the flames that danced over them. Before finally, the canisters exploded, a small fire ball blew burnt flesh and meat all over.

She laughed out loud seeing the burning fire cleanse the unclean, bringing her las rifle back up to bear on the wall top leaning into her sights she snaps off more. Haldwan follows through, but auto rifle fire stitches across the side throwing chinks of plastcrete into the air forcing him, Tonia, and a few others down for cover.

Over the snaps and cracks of weapons fire, Haldwan hears low thuds and glances down the line. Puffs of light crimson mist out from the line of bodies that were against the wall, two Cadians stumble backwards and fall to the hard rock followed by another three. "Shit…" the sound of breaking armor and cracking bone seem to chorus over the sounds of battle, making him cringe uneasily a little.

"Sacred Throne…" he shivers, turning back and kneeling by the wall with las rifle in hand. Scoping through the low power sights of his weapon and started to fire back. The rifle's stock smacking into his shoulder loudly with each snap, he continued counting off his score mentally. 'Twenty-eight, twenty –night, thirty….'

"…THIRTY-ONE THRITY-two, thirty-three, and thirty-four; yeah that's all I could find sir that wasn't either busy or already manning something." Leair's adjutant calls to him from behind, using the stylus to scroll down the list of names that were called up as they walked down a dark corridor, illuminated by just a few lamp packs that were left hanging on the walls from months before.

"And with me that's thirty-five." He says scratching his grey stubble that was growing around his chin. His old boots clapping against the mesh flooring towards the end of the corridor, tremors from the fighting raging outside bring down pillars of dust and dirt that gather in small mounds on the floor. Leair stops reaching to door; sounds of engines revving, and turning over, as well as several voices and mechanical work send their sounds through think metal door.

Tapping in a series of keys on the pad hanging on a small stand, the pad chirped and the door slid into the wall. The mixture of sounds suddenly ceased as the door was winched inside the wall and Leair stepped through to great them. "Attenshun!" An officer in the back and the large garage of mechanics, officers, and tankers, in unison, stood up and snapped straight up and ridged. They all spun on their heels to the door and faced Leair, simultaneously snapping a salute to him.

He couldn't help but grin weakly at the sight, to be back on the ground, to be back on the field of battle. Just like when he was company commander of the Nordian 47th armored company four decades ago when he was a twenty year old Captain. Now at his tolling age of sixty he is now ready to face the long odds of fighting again. "At ease," he called to them, and they in turn loosened up and watched as Leair walked to the railing to look over the mix of men and women gathered. As well as the six Leman Russ battle tanks that flanked them on the walls. "To be back on the field and to serve the Emperor once more," He sighs content fully, calmly looking to the six LRMBT's. "To be back in His graces to give me one more chance to fight along with those who follow me, tonight will decide what has been given us. To fight for the lives of many or to glorious death that may become of it, it feels good to be back with my boots on the ground and see where I am willing to face it."

An entire minute of silence and glances moved through the group. Everyone looked to Leair as he bowed his head to them, and one by one they clapped. The claps moving into a loud cheer that echoed in the massive garage. "Mount up! We're moving out in ten!" He ordered as he walked down to the lower floor meeting up with his adjutant. "Where is my vehicle, Haller?" He asks.

Haller looks down to the data slate again and points to a Dark grey and blue patterned schemed Leman Russ behind Leair. "Sir that will be yours _The Hallow Saber,_ a Vanquisher class Russ, sir._"_ He said calmly to his officer, which bowed his thanks and patted his shoulder. Haller grinned and bowed his head back. "It was an honor serving under you sir. Good luck and may the Emperor watch over you and your Company."

"And for you and the rest of this Hive." Leair replies walking over the Vanquisher tank and using the hand holds on the back to help himself up to the hatch. "In the name of the Emperor!" He shouts, punching a gloved fist into the air as the Russes began to rumble to life, their large engines turning over once more time. _The Hallow Saber_ roared and thundered out of the garage entrance first, followed by _Fiery Gallows, A for Absolution, the Last Crusader _and_ Acheron's Bane. _The six Leman Russes rolled over the rubble strewn highway to the Northern gates, dust and smoke billowing behind them.

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Same as I said above, just read, review and enjoy. Next chapter will coming up soon by next week or so I hope.


	2. Chapter 2

Yeah...sorry for the long delay. Just a short update cause I was running short on time.

Enjoy.

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**CHAPTER TWO**

Elim's bolt pistol bucked again as the muzzle flashed with another shot thrown straight in to the mob of on rushing bodies. The bolt clipped an armored shoulder plate of a front cultist, jerking it back and into his comrade behind him where the bolt had already penetrated. A blast of gore and bone shot out of the cultist's chest and they both fell to the ground.

His lines won't be able to hold off this charge. They just kept on coming, one dropped and three more just merged in and filled the spot. Firing off another two shots, Elim counted another kill, seeing an Archenemy Icon bearer crumple over holding his spilling innards over the bloodied and pitted earth. "We can't hold them off forever!" Bently yelled to him, his las rifle snapping at what ever he saw as a target. A burst of three las shots sent three bolts down range and vaporized the shoulder of one, and burned into the stomach of another.

"I know," Elim hissed biting his lower lip he drops the box magazine of his bolt pistol and digs for another in his thigh pocket. Las fire and heavy slug rounds crack past him inside the small dug out. "We need to hold on for n-"A clap of metal on metal and the magazine he just managed to fish out is blasted out of his hand. Cursing loudly he drops back and pressed up against the sand bag wall. "Frack! Frack! Frack!" He shouts peaking over the edge of the pit.

He glances to the magazine that was now lying at his feet, eyes going wide. An auto rifle slug had buried it self about a two centimeters into the metal casing of the ammo magazine. Glancing to Bently who was equally wide eyed, he slid out his las pistol from his hip holster and handed it to Elim. "Sir, think you might need this now." He chuckled and tossed it into his lap and then went on to firing over the wall of sand bags again.

Elim grinned and lifted the small Mk. III Cadian pattern las pistol and switched the power toggle to half charge and leveled it down range; depressing the trigger letting one las bolt burn into the chest of a leaping cultist, throwing the trooper back wards into the mob.

Leair's small company of Leman Russes rolled through the main through fair towards the North Gate. The ceaseless thumps of the constant concussions of detonating munitions loosening the damaged inner sheeting of the interior; a stray shell punched through upper level of the wall bringing down several cat walks, light fixtures, vents and all sorts of other scrap that landed just a few meters off to his left.

Flinching to the sounds of crumpling and snapping metal, Leair looks to the pile as they speed past it. Holding his ceremonial saber in his gloved hands he shouts over into the vox bead the Litany of Protection and Prayer of Victory over and over with the others; each one reciting each verse in return. Finishing the final lines of the Prayer he slides back under the copula leaving the hatch open, peering down into smoke and dust filled insides of the armored hull, Leair looks to Loader Hawthorne and Driver Murdoc just below.

"Aye sir, everything ok?" Hawthorne calls over the reverberations of the moving tank.

"Yes trooper, just seeing if you all are." He grins back, his aged face accenting the folds of his wrinkles. The Loader salutes and leans back against the turret hold and snaps a salute to him, returning to rechecking the Vanquisher rounds that are stacked on the wall adjacent to him.

The vox channels crackled to life once again, sputtering loudly at first before the signals cleared and a voice squawked through. "_Acheron's Bane _to_ The Hollow Saber_, sir I have foot mobiles twenty meters ahead, counting at least a hundred, sir. Call on the R.O.E?"

Leair picked up the head set hanging beside him and placed it on him, pressing the ear piece to and mouth piece to where they went and dialed the channel. He spoke into it. "_Acheron's Bane_, they armed? Vector? Anything?" He asked back.

"No sir, plain clothed civvies, carrying baggage, their vector….I would say eighteen meters to my twelve o'clock moving to us." The officer replied back.

Leair opened up the top of the cupola. The hatch clattering loudly behind him as it struck the top of the Vanquisher turret. His short cropped white hair, and weathered face look out ahead past _Acheron's Bane_, his eyes widened and his jaw slacked. Out before him were at least hundred to two hundred bodies packed in the sidewalks and street ahead of them. Muttering a curse to himself he presses the vox bead to his ear. "Be on guard, but let's give our citizens some hope of our defense."

Outside, the guardsmen and women held firm against the oncoming hordes of Chaos filth. The air was thick fire. Bolts of light and solid shot cut through the sky. Smoke and fire choked the sky line. The day turned to even as the sun's light filtered through the thick, oily smoke. A dim light of the morning barely broke though. The day was now the dusk.

In front of Eilm's dugout the lined troopers managed to hold their own for most of the morning. Fire from the wall top, and heavy weapons behind them held off most of the Chaos mob back from the initial trench line. But their weapons couldn't hold out the sea of bodies for long. Before long, the Archenemy will be upon them in a matter of hours, if not minutes. They needed help and fast, but they didn't show that sign of weakness in the face of the fallen and traitorous forces.

In the face of it all, they were going to stand and hold, and die if they had too. They were going to die standing the line.

The vox crackled, Bently ducked under the sandbags once more discarding an empty battery to the corner where is last five were piled along with Elim's. Reaching over the table to reach the horn of the vox caster, he handed it to his officer. Once it was passed on to the Captain, Bently raised up his las rifle once more. Pulling another battery from his hip pouch and slammed it back into it hold. The weapon whined as it warmed back up.

Elim crouched under an over turned table, his original sandbag cover was taken out by a lucky grenade that threw him on his back. Which was why he was wearing a helmet because his treasured peak cap was blown off his skull, he tilted the helmet to the side to give some space to press the receiver to his ear. Listening closely over the sounds of battle, he tries to focus on it.

Staccato las and auto fire echo and ring against the sound piece. Sporadic and garbled yell, but one thing did make it through. As loud as any thing else in this hell hole, the static of someone picking up the headset and someone breathing meant that there is some life on the other end of it.

Trooper Dinnae scrambled over to the vox caster's body, Comms Specialist Omar had taken a full on spray of las fire blowing his shoulder to bits and burning away his chest and face. She nearly gagged as when she rolled his smoking body over smelling the burnt fat and flesh to reach to reach the Specialist's headset.

Tearing it off his burnt face, she put on the head set. Gripping her auto pistol she looked around the trench. Trooper Daniels convulsed and crashed to the muddy floor as auto fire splintered the duckboards with fire. Trooper Halt and Meters dashed past her to the second line. Sergeant Reynolds was left, but he was little good with a bleeding head wound and shrapnel wounds to his leg. It was pretty helpless right now.

"This is section two nine, two nine to anyone who can hear me they have broken through. Repeat they have-"She spoke quickly but stopped as las bolt splintered the duckboard beside her. Dinne looked up and snapped her auto pistol to the top of the trench. Two shots rang out and a cultist's body toppled in and landed beside her. "We are pulling back over, we ar-"Dinnae's voice cuts out.

A smoking hole in her stomach from a las rifle shot, four more troopers clad in red long coats leaped into the trench and fired at her and Reynolds, the Archenemy soldiers emptied their clips into the two bodies and Dinnae's body splashed into the mud. Her body blasted and burned beyond recognition.

The line went dead, but the sounds of trampling feet and hollering laughter resounded through the head set. Elim pulled away shocked from the horn. His face looked to the device in shock. Tossing it to the side he crouched low and pulled up his monoscope. "Shite!" He yelled. "They're breaking through the left flank. We need to get that hole fixed." He said.

He grabbed the horn again and dialed the channel. "Break in the left, shift fire left to hold off that front." He ordered through the vox system.

The lines of fire split to counter act the lost trench section. Las weapon and heavy weapon fire shifted to take that open space and clear it of its new owners. Mortars in the back at the base of the wall adjusted coordinates. The four tubes angled themselves to aim for the trench; a spotter just a meter in front of them raises an open hand; pressing a vox bead to his ear with the other.

"Baker, mortar fire mission, forward section, trench line 30 meters; fire for effect." The vox crackles.

"Shot, over!" The spotter calls back, throwing his hand down.

The signal cast, the others did their part. Each loader leaned over and slid the shot down the tube. Everyone ducked back as each tube thumped loudly and launched the small explosive shell into the air.

With a slight whistle the four shells dipped and arched downwards towards the trench. The twenty-seven or so Archenemy troopers that huddled there for a belief of sanctuary in the small slit in the earth. They were about to follow the two guardsmen that managed to escape their fire when one stopped.

"You hear that…?" It hissed beneath its black scarf. The others stopped and listened, but the sounds of the fighting masked the whistling of the light artillery that was bearing down on them. The one that noticed sound tugged the scarf down seeing a deep scar running from the top of his left eye down to his mouth. A small scowl tugged at his lips as they twitched.

"Coverrrr!" He yelled as the first mortar shell landed just over the side of the trench. The duck boards caved inwards from the concussion bringing a wall of dirt down on six of the chaos soldiers burying them alive. The second one made a crater in the trench blowing the mud and wood six meters upwards, taking the bodies of four more.

The others tried to break and scrambled over the sides of the trench. The other two shells land on both sides of the trench. The explosions and flying pieces of heated metal scythe through the air, the cultists drop to the ground, some tumble back into the splintered and pitted trench. The few that still managed to live, lie broken and torn up in the mud. They call out helplessly into the air as they die slowly from stomach, chest and a multitude of bloody wounds caused by the pieces of metal.

"Shot, over!" The spotter calls once more. The mortars thump once more. Lobbing their shells into the heavens once more, with its low whistling breaking through the war just below.

On his back, the Chaos sergeant looks up to the smoky sky once more. An open wound t o his stomach left him paralyzed and feeling cold. Hissing in pain, blood pouring out of his mouth, the heretic mutters darkly. Feeling his intestines, running a hand over the stomach wound; "There will be more of usss….more to fight you Imperial bastardsss! Death to the false Emp-"His final word cut short, a mortar silencing him forever as the explosion vaporizes his body into ashes leaving only a two meter wide hole of mud and earth.

Tonia ducked back behind the wall once more, discarding her spent las battery, to the plastcrete floor. Tugging her khaki beret down over her forehead as more shot stitched pass, she presses the vox headset to her ear hearing Elim's voice call over it. Hearing the words; "Break in the left flank." She peaks over the edge of wall.

A stray auto slug rips the wall edge beside her face blowing chips of stone and plastcrete into her cheek. Cursing loudly falling sideways from the splash of the slug and crashes into Haldwan. "Sergeant, ya alright?" He asks helping her sit up against the wall.

Pressing her gloved hand to the side of her face she nods moving it off showing a few cuts from the plastcrete debris, but other than that she was fine. "Yeah Hal, I m fine." She smirked getting back up into a crouch against the wall; Tonia taps the trooper's shoulder. "Hey, you with me;" she pauses to press the bead of her headset to her mouth. "Relts, Moore, Henniger, on me now."

Cocking his head slightly seeing her call the rest of her surviving squad over, Haldwan looks over Tonia's shoulder. Seeing the three troopers run up to where they were. One dropped to a knee and slide to a halt in front of Tonia. Tilting his helmet up from his eyes the gaunt looking trooper spoke up over the fire. "Sarge, what's the problem?" He asked.

"We're heading down to the lower floor, seems part of our left side had folded." She said to them. "We're going to fill that space." Tonia smirked. Grabbing her las rifle from the floor and dusting it off. She ejects the battery, examining it quickly she slams it back into its hold and lets it warm up. "Hope your ready boys, our day might have just gotten interesting."


End file.
